Modification, elimination of widowhood rites; Widows Network takes action
Some widowhood rites infringe on the fundamental human rights of women and impact negatively on the lives of women who go through them. This makes it imperative for traditional authorities and organisations that have the interest of women at heart to take measures to modify or abolish these rights.
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As part of the processes to help identify some of the widowhood practices that impact negatively on women's rights, a Widows Network was formed in the Talensi and Nabdam districts in the Upper East Region to find out whether traditional authorities were engaging their respective communities to adopt measures to modify some of these practices.
For this reason, the Network visited communities such as Wakii, Pwalugu, Tongo, Pelungu, Zanlerigu, Sheiga, Datujo, Gorogo, Kpatia, Nangodi, Kongo and Gbee last December.
Widowhood practices
At the end of their work, the Network identified forced marriages, seizure of deceased husbands’ properties, shaving of hair of widows and test of infidelity on the part of the widow by the bite of an ant as some of the practices that still persisted.
Other rites identified in the communities include, making the widow sit on the rubbish dump, mixing of soot for the widow to eat, seizure of the bride price of widow's female children and putting a calabash on the head of a widow and making sacrifices on it after which the widow was asked to eat from the same calabash, among other practices.
The Women and Orphans Movement (WOM) and ActionAid Ghana, both non-governmental organisations, have, therefore, engaged traditional authorities and widows in the Talensi and Nabdam districts in the Upper East Region to develop a road map towards the modification and elimination of some of these widowhood rites.
This measure was adopted after a series of consultations and sensitisation of traditional authorities by the two organisations over the past 22 years to raise the consciousness of chiefs and opinion leaders to help modify some of the widowhood rites.
Declaration
The two organisations are also supporting efforts geared towards ensuring that traditional authorities in the region, with support from the Upper East Regional House of Chiefs, make a public royal declaration of all the widowhood rites that are outmoded as their contribution towards guaranteeing the rights of women.
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During the engagement between the traditional authorities and members of the Widows Network to discuss the findings of the Network, it came up that the awareness of some of the traditional rulers were raised, hence they pledged their commitment towards the development of the road map to help modify some of the widowhood rites.
The Women's Rights Officer of WOM, Madam Felicia Anambire, observed that the efforts towards the modification of some of the "shameful widowhood practices have been slow, nevertheless it is expected that when the road map is developed, the traditional authorities would be more committed towards the modification of the rites".
Target
"Our target is to ensure that those rites that militate against women's rights are abolished or modified," Madam Anambire stressed.
According to her, the challenges to modifying or eliminating some of the widowhood rites include the reluctance of some of the traditional rulers to modify the rites as they formed part of the cultural practices of the people, as well as the fact that although in some of the communities traditional rulers had banned some of the practices, people still secretly enforced them.
The Programme Officer of ActionAid at Zebilla, Madam Juliet Adams, pointed out that a royal declaration by the traditional authorities on all outmoded widowhood rites was necessary in complementing efforts at eliminating those practices considered to be against the rights of women.